REALNESS screenwriting residency commenced on June 16 in
partnership with the Durban Talents programme at The Durban International Film
Festival and the Durban FilmMart. It was conceived by Urucu Media as a way of
addressing a need for promising African film projects to be resourced and
supported in the development phase in order to be competitive in the global
film market. The five selected residents were announced in Cannes and will
begin their participation with an immersive industry experience where they will
introduce their projects during Story Junction, an open project presentation on
June 20 at 15h00 at the Elangeni Hotel.
During their time at the festival, the participants will be
under the mentorship of Nigerian-British script consultant, Selina Ukwuoma.
Selina regularly tutors, lectures, and leads workshops in screenwriting and
pitching at film schools and film festivals. In the past, she worked for EON
screenwriters’ Workshop, literary and talent agency Curtis Brown, and their
production arm CUBA Pictures. Projects she has worked on range from the
BAFTA-winning Boy A to The Teddy and FIPRESCI Prize-winning Hoje Eu Quero Voltar Sozinho (The Way He
Looks). Ukwuoma has completed degrees in screenwriting, professional
writing, and social anthropology.
After the Durban leg, participants will move into their
residency space at Nirox in The Cradle of Humankind. Where they will be
mentored by Nadja Dumouchel. Nadja is currently engaged with Groupe Ouest and
European Short Pitch, in universities teaching scriptwriting, as a reader for
the CNC and in film journalism. She worked as a programmer and commissioning
editor for ARTE’s short film magazine Court-Circuit. She was later hired by the
international distribution and production company Premium Films in Paris,
before going back to ARTE in the feature film section in 2010. Nadja was
trained as a story editor at the TorinoFilmLab and facilitates the program Next
Step, run by Cannes Semaine De La Critique. She is co-founder of “La
Scénaristerie”, a development platform for screenwriters in Paris.
REALNESS is thrilled to welcome new partners, Locarno
Filmmakers Academy, Midpoint and Cinémathèque Africa. Locarno Filmmakers
Academy facilitates daily interaction with directors, producers and other
industry professionals with an international profile will allow participants to
explore their own directorial identities and hone their professional skills. On
June 5 it was announced that Hiwot Adamasu was selected to attend this year’s
edition. Midpoint was conceived with the aim of strengthening creative
collaboration between writer, director and producer in the development process.
One of the residents will be invited, along with their producer, to attend the
Feature Launch Workshop of 2017 with a full scholarship.
Founded in 1961 by the Instituit Francais, the Cinémathèque
Africa offers one of the most important collections of African films from the
1960s to today. The African Film Library offers professionals and programmers
around the globe a catalog of over 1600 films for noncommercial distribution.
The initiative is donating 20 films to REALNESS for case study during the course
of the six-week residency, complimenting the World Cinema Fund’s contribution
of absolute access to WCF On Demand, a VoD platform which showcases their most
successful supported films. These film libraries will be an inportant resource
to the residents.
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